Editing Positron (section)

== Artificial production ==
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Physicists at the [[Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory]] in California have used a short, ultra-intense [[laser]] to irradiate a millimeter-thick [[gold]] target and produce more than 100&nbsp;billion positrons.<ref>
{{cite news
 |last=Bland |first=E.
 |date=1 December 2008
 |title=Laser technique produces bevy of antimatter
 |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna27998860
 |quote=The LLNL scientists created the positrons by shooting the lab's high-powered Titan laser onto a one-millimeter-thick piece of gold.
 |publisher=[[NBC News]]
 |access-date=6 April 2016
}}</ref> Presently significant lab production of 5&nbsp;MeV positron-electron beams allows investigation of multiple characteristics such as how different elements react to 5&nbsp;MeV positron interactions or impacts, how energy is transferred to particles, and the shock effect of [[gamma-ray burst]]s.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Chen |first=Hui |date=February 2012 |title=Relativistic Electron-positron Plasma Jets Using High-intensity Lasers |url=https://lasers.llnl.gov/workshops/user_group_2012/docs/7.3_chen.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120512122456/https://lasers.llnl.gov/workshops/user_group_2012/docs/7.3_chen.pdf |archive-date=12 May 2012 |website=[[Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory]]}} Lab production of 5MeV positron-electron beams.</ref>

In 2023, a collaboration between [[CERN]] and [[University of Oxford]] performed an experiment at the HiRadMat facility<ref>{{cite web |url=https://hiradmat.web.cern.ch/ |title=The HiRadMat Facility at SPS |date= 8 Dec 2023}}
</ref> in which nano-second duration beams of electron-positron pairs were produced containing more than 10 trillion electron-positron pairs, so creating the first 'pair plasma' in the laboratory with sufficient density to support collective plasma behavior.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Arrowsmith |first1=C. D. |last2=Simon |first2=P. |last3=Bilbao |first3=P. J. |last4=Bott |first4=A. F. A. |last5=Burger |first5=S. |last6=Chen |first6=H. |last7=Cruz |first7=F. D. |last8=Davenne |first8=T. |last9=Efthymiopoulos |first9=I. |last10=Froula |first10=D. H. |last11=Goillot |first11=A. |last12=Gudmundsson |first12=J. T. |last13=Haberberger |first13=D. |last14=Halliday |first14=J. W. D. |last15=Hodge |first15=T. |date=2024-06-12 |title=Laboratory realization of relativistic pair-plasma beams |journal=Nature Communications |language=en |volume=15 |issue=1 |pages=5029 |doi=10.1038/s41467-024-49346-2 |pmid=38866733 |pmc=11169600 |issn=2041-1723|arxiv=2312.05244 |bibcode=2024NatCo..15.5029A }}</ref> Future experiments offer the possibility to study physics relevant to extreme astrophysical environments where copious electron-positron pairs are generated, such as [[gamma-ray bursts]], [[fast radio bursts]] and [[blazar]] jets.